Science can't destroy Religion

[Charlemagne_II]

ABRACADABRA!

This is a magical incantation whereby those who deny that there was Anyone there at the start to create the laws and order, can now insist that the laws and the order created themselves … Abracadabra!

That’s a more far out type of magic than was ever held to be possible by any theist!

Isaac Newton: Laws of Thermodynamics, Optics, etc.

“God in the beginning formed matter in solid, massy, hard, impenetrable, movable particles, of such sizes and figures, and with such other properties, and in such proportion to space, as most conduced to the end for which he formed them.”

Charles Darwin: Theory of Evolution

“There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.” Origin of the Species, 1872 (last edition before Darwin’s death).

Albert Einstein: Theories of Relativity

“I have never found a better expression than “religious” for this trust in the rational nature of reality and of its peculiar accessibility to the human mind. Where this trust is lacking science degenerates into an uninspired procedure. Let the devil care if the priests make capital out of this. There is no remedy for that.”

Max Born: Quantum Physicist

“Those who say that the study of science makes a man an atheist must be rather silly.”

Werner Heisenberg: Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle

“The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you.”

**ABRACADABRA! **

 

[CopticChristian]

ABRACADABRA!

This is a magical incantation whereby those who deny that there was Anyone there at the start to create the laws and order, can now insist that the laws and the order created themselves … Abracadabra!

That’s a more far out type of magic than was ever held to be possible by any theist!

Isaac Newton: Laws of Thermodynamics, Optics, etc.

“God in the beginning formed matter in solid, massy, hard, impenetrable, movable particles, of such sizes and figures, and with such other properties, and in such proportion to space, as most conduced to the end for which he formed them.”

Charles Darwin: Theory of Evolution

“There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.” Origin of the Species, 1872 (last edition before Darwin’s death).

Albert Einstein: Theories of Relativity

“I have never found a better expression than “religious” for this trust in the rational nature of reality and of its peculiar accessibility to the human mind. Where this trust is lacking science degenerates into an uninspired procedure. Let the devil care if the priests make capital out of this. There is no remedy for that.”

Max Born: Quantum Physicist

“Those who say that the study of science makes a man an atheist must be rather silly.”

Werner Heisenberg: Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle

“The first gulp from the glass of natural sciences will turn you into an atheist, but at the bottom of the glass God is waiting for you.”

**ABRACADABRA! **

So you agree with my posting that Science Can’t Destroy Religion…Wow…am I glad…:coolinoff::clapping:

 

[Touchstone]

Disagree. Whether our experience reflects reality is one of those lame questions only metaphysicians ask.

Then we are all metaphysicians, because science cannot get off the ground without making this commitment. It’s implicit in the practice of building scientific models – ask any scientist: why do we prefer more performative models over less performative models? Why do we suppose ‘working models’ are useful?

Because they are understood to be useful ‘maps’ of the extra-mental ‘territory’, that’s why!

Of course it does, it’s excessively obvious.

It’s not obvious, when given just a little scrutiny. What do you suppose the millenia-long philsophical war over idealism/realism was about?

I’m reading The Boy Who Harnessed The Wind by William Kamkwamba, and just got to the bit where aged 13, he and his friend figure out how transistor radios work purely by fiddling around with old circuit boards in a shack in deepest Malawi. That’s science, that’s great science.

Yes, and as a practical matter, it’s a good thing that we take the ‘reality of reality’ as known through our senses as a given. It’s a bit like a fish not being aware he’s “in the water”; he’s so in it, always in it, that “being in the water” is not a subject of interest. For us, we have the reality of reality as such a ubiquitous fundamental (excepting of course, when some of us take license with our intuitions and superstitions where we can afford to and want to), that we don’t give it second thought.

Nor do we need to, in doing science, or going about our daily lives.

But, the 13 year old boy figuring out solid state electronics is relying on the same metaphysical axiom that all scientific knowledge rests on: his experiences really do reflect the extra-mental world around him to some useful degree. This is metaphyics, unavoidable, inescapable, ever-present metaphysics. That 13 year old boy does not need to remind himself of this, or think twice about it, any more than I do when I’m writing genetic algorithms, or driving my car down the road.

Science is pragmatic, nothing to do with whether we know that we know what we know. Of course we do.

The "of course’ there is precisely the metaphysical commitment I’m talking about! Of course our experiences reflect reality! Consider the negation of that, and the point may be clearer. If we did not take it as an “of course” – and some do not – that our experiences are veridical to some good extent, there would not be any reason to think we could understand a transistor, and build our own circuits.

Science is pragmatic, and that’s a good thing. We only do metaphysics because we have to; it’s a necesary, bootstrapping ‘evil’.This is a huge change from the past, when metaphysics was considered the ‘queen of sciences’, and produced all manner of inscrutable, non-accountable fluff to prove it. But you can’t avoid doing some enabling metaphysics. See the logical positivists and the ditch they fell into philosophically because their hope to eschew metaphysics entirely, to be ‘entirely pragmatic’ in a verificationist sense. Pragmatism itself has metaphysical underpinnings, though.

It’s good to avoid the promiscuity and frivolity of theology and other non-practical and incorrigible metapshyics. But some bootstrapping is necessary, and will happen whether we want it to or not.

Again nope. Science can be defined simply as the systematic study of the universe, where “universe” means everything, so you can only really limit science by excluding things which can’t be studied systematically. Nor is science limited to only the scientific method, which the social sciences tend not to use.

Theology is not distinguishable from science under that definition. As you know, theology is quite amenable to systematization. The key difference is the epistemology that grounds science, and that is a naturalist epistemology – natural explanations for natural phenomena. That’s the distinction that separates out theology, and yet includes the social and “soft” sciences. We might say that the danger here is equivocation on ‘systematization’; science provides rigorous semantics for what ‘can be systematized’ means, and what models can be composed of, and how models interlock and stack on top of each other.

One can be (and some are) systematic in studying the universe as astrologists. “Systematics” is just a method, and you can apply systematics to any number of pursuits and intellectual domains. Science systematizes natural models, based on natural phenomena. It’s the “natural”/empirical requirement that distinguishes science from theology, astrology and many other -ologies that can be and are systematized disciplines.

And find me a job ad for “Ecologist - must have formal background in metaphysics” and I’ll eat my hat.

The metaphysics for science are minimalist, bootstraps. A small child can (and does, intuitively – humans are hiredwired empiricists) understand the concepts, and will just shrug at the “of course” nature of those fundamental commitments. They can be and mostly are taken for granted. But they have to be taken.

-TS

 

[CopticChristian]

Then we are all metaphysicians, because science cannot get off the ground without making this commitment. It’s implicit in the practice of building scientific models – ask any scientist: why do we prefer more performative models over less performative models? Why do we suppose ‘working models’ are useful?

Because they are understood to be useful ‘maps’ of the extra-mental ‘territory’, that’s why!

It’s not obvious, when given just a little scrutiny. What do you suppose the millenia-long philsophical war over idealism/realism was about?

Yes, and as a practical matter, it’s a good thing that we take the ‘reality of reality’ as known through our senses as a given. It’s a bit like a fish not being aware he’s “in the water”; he’s so in it, always in it, that “being in the water” is not a subject of interest. For us, we have the reality of reality as such a ubiquitous fundamental (excepting of course, when some of us take license with our intuitions and superstitions where we can afford to and want to), that we don’t give it second thought.

Nor do we need to, in doing science, or going about our daily lives.

But, the 13 year old boy figuring out solid state electronics is relying on the same metaphysical axiom that all scientific knowledge rests on: his experiences really do reflect the extra-mental world around him to some useful degree. This is metaphyics, unavoidable, inescapable, ever-present metaphysics. That 13 year old boy does not need to remind himself of this, or think twice about it, any more than I do when I’m writing genetic algorithms, or driving my car down the road.

The "of course’ there is precisely the metaphysical commitment I’m talking about! Of course our experiences reflect reality! Consider the negation of that, and the point may be clearer. If we did not take it as an “of course” – and some do not – that our experiences are veridical to some good extent, there would not be any reason to think we could understand a transistor, and build our own circuits.

Science is pragmatic, and that’s a good thing. We only do metaphysics because we have to; it’s a necesary, bootstrapping ‘evil’.This is a huge change from the past, when metaphysics was considered the ‘queen of sciences’, and produced all manner of inscrutable, non-accountable fluff to prove it. But you can’t avoid doing some enabling metaphysics. See the logical positivists and the ditch they fell into philosophically because their hope to eschew metaphysics entirely, to be ‘entirely pragmatic’ in a verificationist sense. Pragmatism itself has metaphysical underpinnings, though.

It’s good to avoid the promiscuity and frivolity of theology and other non-practical and incorrigible metapshyics. But some bootstrapping is necessary, and will happen whether we want it to or not.

Theology is not distinguishable from science under that definition. As you know, theology is quite amenable to systematization. The key difference is the epistemology that grounds science, and that is a naturalist epistemology – natural explanations for natural phenomena. That’s the distinction that separates out theology, and yet includes the social and “soft” sciences. We might say that the danger here is equivocation on ‘systematization’; science provides rigorous semantics for what ‘can be systematized’ means, and what models can be composed of, and how models interlock and stack on top of each other.

One can be (and some are) systematic in studying the universe as astrologists. “Systematics” is just a method, and you can apply systematics to any number of pursuits and intellectual domains. Science systematizes natural models, based on natural phenomena. It’s the “natural”/empirical requirement that distinguishes science from theology, astrology and many other -ologies that can be and are systematized disciplines.

The metaphysics for science are minimalist, bootstraps. A small child can (and does, intuitively – humans are hiredwired empiricists) understand the concepts, and will just shrug at the “of course” nature of those fundamental commitments. They can be and mostly are taken for granted. But they have to be taken.

-TS

TS,

I want to be good. Please help me.

Define and then give me some simple examples for my simple mind.

Promiscuity of Theology.

Frivolity of Theology.

Thank you, I need help so I can be good.

OK:thumbsup:

 

[Al_Moritz]

Precisely, it is a philosophical idea outside the very nature of scientific epistemology. Just like the idea that the natural world is all there is. In your own words: You won’t find that in any scientific models. None.

It is a philosophical idea outside the very nature of scientific epistemology.

Here is what the American National Academy of Sciences (NAS) said on this (emphasis added):

(Link: nap.edu/openbook.php?isbn=0309063647&page=58)

“Science is a way of knowing about the natural world. It is limited to explaining the natural world through natural causes. Science can say nothing about the supernatural. Whether God exists or not is a question about which science is neutral.”

Exactly. The supernatural or lack thereof lies outside scientific epistemology, the method of exploring the natural world by observation and experiment. Anything that deserves the label ‘scientific’ must fall within this epistemology.

Hence, naturalism is not a “scientific” worldview, since naturalism, the view that the natural world is all there is, lies outside scientific epistemology.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Al

In like manner, all other ways of knowing are outside scientific epistemology, from morals to politics to music. There is no way to scientifically “explain” why “Ave Verum Corpus” by Mozart is such a profoundly beautiful piece of music. The theological explanation, of course, would be that it is a prayer to the Eucharist that also defies scientific explanation.

 

[Al_Moritz]

Al

In like manner, all other ways of knowing are outside scientific epistemology, from morals to politics to music. There is no way to scientifically “explain” why “Ave Verum Corpus” by Mozart is such a profoundly beautiful piece of music. The theological explanation, of course, would be that it is a prayer to the Eucharist that also defies scientific explanation.

Precisely.

Also something like the experience of the color Red (in general, everything that is called ‘qualia’ in philosophy) lies outside science. Yes, we know that it is the result of light of a certain wavelength falling on the retina, which then via nerve pulses transfers a signal to the brain that then is processed etc. But this scientific, technical explanation still does not describe the experience itself. Even if science could map with precision and in the finest detail all the neuronal firings in the brain that are connected with this experience, it would still not describe the subjective experience of the color Red itself.

Such considerations show that the idea that nothing lies outside the purview of science, and “someday science will explain everything”, is just silly.

 

[Touchstone]

TS,

I want to be good. Please help me.

Define and then give me some simple examples for my simple mind.

Promiscuity of Theology.

Frivolity of Theology.

Thank you, I need help so I can be good.

OK:thumbsup:

OK, here’s a pretty glaring example that pops to mind:

God, our Creator and Lord, can be known with certainty, by the natural light of reason from created things.

That isn’t “ergo” from anything, mind you. It’s “de fide”.

Lots more where than came from, as you likely now. Sorry, don’t have enough familiarity with Coptic dogma/theology to pick on that (if you were thinking of something more apropos to your username).

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

Precisely.

Also something like the experience of the color Red (in general, everything that is called ‘qualia’ in philosophy) lies outside science. Yes, we know that it is the result of light of a certain wavelength falling on the retina, which then via nerve pulses transfers a signal to the brain that then is processed etc. But this scientific, technical explanation still does not describe the experience itself. Even if science could map with precision and in the finest detail all the neuronal firings in the brain that are connected with this experience, it would still not describe the subjective experience of the color Red itself.

How is this known? That’s quite a breakthrough if that has indeed been established?

If such detailed knowledge of the workings of our brain were available, why would that not suffice as they description of our subjective experience? We don’t have such detailed info available at this point, so there’s a lot we cannot answer in terms of the mechanics of consciousness. But this seems another case where science is butting up against raw, incorrigible intuition – no matter what you guys find, I will deny that you are describing my experiences!

If that’s not the case, then it begs the question: what would, in principle, qualify as a description of subjective experience? Or is it really just impenetrable magic?

Such considerations show that the idea that nothing lies outside the purview of science, and “someday science will explain everything”, is just silly.

No chance in that. Science is slow, methodically, and accountable not only to the performance of particular models, but the integration of new models into all our other models in a coherent way (chemistry models are necessarily based on lower level physics models, for example). ‘Total knowledge’ is not even a coherent concept in scientific epistemology.

Science is check on our intuitions, though. Tonyrey asserts that we will never be able to tell why we might find a symphony by Mozart beautiful, but there’s no reason for us to suppose such, aside from the conceits of our intuition. If we had much fuller knowledge of the brain’s network dynamics and neurophysics, and could predict, with accuracy, whether an analyzed subject would like a particular bit of music that s/he had never heard before, why would that not constitute knowledge about musical tastes and subjective aesthetics in humans.

Would you, or Tonyrey, still assert that science still doesn’t know anything about a person’s sense of (musical) beauty in light of demonstrations to the contrary?

-TS

 

[Al_Moritz]

If such detailed knowledge of the workings of our brain were available, why would that not suffice as they description of our subjective experience?

As I fully expected, you confuse quantitative description of an experience with the experience itself. Your mind just can’t get out of your (pseudo-) scientific box, can it?

 

[Touchstone]

As I fully expected, you confuse quantitative description of an experience with the experience itself. Your mind just can’t get out of your (pseudo-) scientific box, can it?

No. like anyone else, I have my own subjective and qualitative experiences to consider, available all the time. What I was getting at was the idea that something supernatural or magical must obtain in those qualitative experiences as distinct from the discrete phenomena we may observe in our brains (electrical activity, neuronal states and firing patterns, etc.).

That is, I don’t experience “wetness” of water numerically, or quantitatively. It’s a qualitative experience. But that doesn’t make my experience magical, or necessarily distinct from the physics (including quantitative) models that we have from science. The wetness of water on my fingers is just the qualitative sensation of a phenomenon we can model quantitatively as well. The object referent is the same, in both cases, in other words.

Why do we suppose this is not the case for other qualitative experience, or qualia as subjective experience in general? The only reason I’m aware of is the Cartesian dualist superstition (which is maintained by many who are not thoroughgoing Cartesian dualists) that our mind is something supernaturally “other” than the activity of our brain. It’s a strong intuition, I grant, but there was little to begin with to power that idea beyond our intution, and less and less as our knowledge of neurology and human cognition advances.

Think about the objection “it’s not the same”. To establish that, you have to have to things to analyze, to compare. What do you have on the “other side” that serves to distinguish mind from mental activity that makes this objection sensible?

-TS

 

[Drinkgasoline]

Many posters on these forums should read more Polkinghorne.

 

[tonyrey]

True, and since we can never be certain whether we know that we know what we know, the pragmatic solution is to say of course we do until proved otherwise. It’s that easy - the reason why science is so successful is because long ago the decision was made to get as far away from metaphysics as possible. As a result, how we interpret scientific theories is up to us, no metaphysicans needed, no doctrines required, they are surplus to requirements, they are ex-parrots.

Did you read my post? What metaphysical principles were the two 13-year old scientists utilizing? Nada, zitch. Metaphysics is dead. 'E’s passed on! This parrot is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E’s expired and gone to meet 'is maker! 'E’s a stiff! Bereft of life, 'e rests in peace! If you hadn’t nailed 'im to the perch 'e’d be pushing up the daisies! 'Is metabolic processes are now 'istory! 'E’s off the twig! 'E’s kicked the bucket, 'e’s shuffled off 'is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the choir invisibile!! THIS IS AN EX-PARROT!!

That’s what the logical positivists thought until they realised the verification principle shattered all their hopes and abandoned their futile attempt to dispose of metaphysics…

 

[Charlemagne_II]

The philosopher Democritus more than 2000 years ago conceived of the existence of an atom, a thing so small you could not see it. He could not scientifically prove its existence, but he could imagine it. Using imagination is a time honored approach to discovering truth. For thousands of years nobody believed in the existence of atoms, though Democritus was right when he said they exist.

By the same token, we can imagine God, and God may well exist, even though we might be without the scientific instruments to detect his presence among us. Even so, we can infer in a number of ways that something we cannot scientifically detect caused the universe to exist, caused the Big Bang. There once was no universe. Now there is.

Abracadabra! Poof!

The theist imagines the universe was created. The atheist imagines it always was.

There is nothing, nada, zilch in science that bolster’s the atheist claim.

Genesis, 1000 B.C. : “Let there be light.”

Carl Sagan in Cosmos, 1980 A.D.

“Ten or twenty billion years ago, something happened – the Big Bang, the event that began our universe…. In that titanic cosmic explosion, the universe began an expansion which has never ceased…. As space stretched, the matter and energy in the universe expanded with it and rapidly cooled. The radiation of the cosmic fireball, which, then as now, filled the universe, moved through the spectrum – from gamma rays to X-rays to ultraviolet light; through the rainbow colors of the visible spectrum; into the infrared and radio regions. The remnants of that fireball, the cosmic background radiation, emanating from all parts of the sky can be detected by radio telescopes today. In the early universe, space was brilliantly illuminated.”

 

[Al_Moritz]

No. like anyone else, I have my own subjective and qualitative experiences to consider, available all the time. What I was getting at was the idea that something supernatural or magical must obtain in those qualitative experiences as distinct from the discrete phenomena we may observe in our brains (electrical activity, neuronal states and firing patterns, etc.).

That is, I don’t experience “wetness” of water numerically, or quantitatively. It’s a qualitative experience. But that doesn’t make my experience magical, or necessarily distinct from the physics (including quantitative) models that we have from science. The wetness of water on my fingers is just the qualitative sensation of a phenomenon we can model quantitatively as well. The object referent is the same, in both cases, in other words.

Why do we suppose this is not the case for other qualitative experience, or qualia as subjective experience in general? The only reason I’m aware of is the Cartesian dualist superstition (which is maintained by many who are not thoroughgoing Cartesian dualists) that our mind is something supernaturally “other” than the activity of our brain. It’s a strong intuition, I grant, but there was little to begin with to power that idea beyond our intution, and less and less as our knowledge of neurology and human cognition advances.

Think about the objection “it’s not the same”. To establish that, you have to have to things to analyze, to compare. What do you have on the “other side” that serves to distinguish mind from mental activity that makes this objection sensible?

-TS

Why do you think I automatically invoke something “magical” when ascertaining the obvious fact that science cannot describe experiences as experiences, or if you will, qualitative experiences – what they are – in quantitative terms in such a manner that they are still recognizable as experiences? There is no dualism involved and no supernaturalism: I am convinced that my dogs experience qualia too.

My point was that the obvious statement, that there are things that are simply outside the purview of science, also holds for just the natural world itself. You don’t need to be a theist to realize this evident fact. Atheist philosopher Thomas Nagel famously does that too when he discusses qualia.

 

[Al_Moritz]

Addendum: Yes, I do believe that dualism applies for certain mental activities, but not necessarily for qualia.

 

[Al_Moritz]

Why do you think I automatically invoke something “magical” when ascertaining the obvious fact that science cannot describe experiences as experiences, or if you will, qualitative experiences – what they are – in quantitative terms in such a manner that they are still recognizable as experiences?

In other words, while science one day may be able to decifer all the physical phenomena (firing of neurons etc.) resulting in an experience, it will never be able to describe what makes a certain experience that experience.

 

[Touchstone]

The philosopher Democritus more than 2000 years ago conceived of the existence of an atom, a thing so small you could not see it. He could not scientifically prove its existence, but he could imagine it. Using imagination is a time honored approach to discovering truth. For thousands of years nobody believed in the existence of atoms, though Democritus was right when he said they exist.

By the same token, we can imagine God, and God may well exist, even though we might be without the scientific instruments to detect his presence among us. Even so, we can infer in a number of ways that something we cannot scientifically detect caused the universe to exist, caused the Big Bang. There once was no universe. Now there is.

Abracadabra! Poof!

But, on a materialist view, it’s not abracadabra, it’s the sorcerer’s incantation of “Let there be light!!!”. It’s just impersonal physics, and the “nothing” that physics posits as the… antecedent, for lack of a better word for a t=0 event is mundane, the type of event that happens as a matter of course. On extrapolating these maths, the theory that understands our quantum physics, and pushes well back toward t=0 (we are limited in the energy scales we can test at, technologically), these kinds of events proceed as a matter of course. It’s implicit in the framework.

There’s no testing that empirically, because its outside our empirical envelope – we don’t have access to the discriminating evidence, even if it does exist (or at least over very indirectly). But the concept could not be less abacadabra if one tried to fashion a conjecture that was anti-magical, impersonal, law-based.

That idea might be mistaken, but it’s all the things that “abracadabra” and “let there be light” are not.

The theist imagines the universe was created. The atheist imagines it always was.

No, I feel quite comfortable with the idea that this universe had a beginining.

There is nothing, nada, zilch in science that bolster’s the atheist claim.

Which claim?

Genesis, 1000 B.C. : “Let there be light.”

Carl Sagan in Cosmos, 1980 A.D.

“Ten or twenty billion years ago, something happened – the Big Bang, the event that began our universe…. In that titanic cosmic explosion, the universe began an expansion which has never ceased…. As space stretched, the matter and energy in the universe expanded with it and rapidly cooled. The radiation of the cosmic fireball, which, then as now, filled the universe, moved through the spectrum – from gamma rays to X-rays to ultraviolet light; through the rainbow colors of the visible spectrum; into the infrared and radio regions. The remnants of that fireball, the cosmic background radiation, emanating from all parts of the sky can be detected by radio telescopes today. In the early universe, space was brilliantly illuminated.”

Yes, but notice the conspicuous absence of the sorcerer, of the magical incantantion that the Bible points us to. I’m quite sure based on the physics involved that it would have been quite a bright flash of light, if we could be immaterial (!) observers at that point (we could not exist as living beings in that context), but the superstition does not obtain from there being light, or a beginning. The superstition obtains in the belief in supernatural creative powers being unleashed by magical utterances.

-TS

 

[Touchstone]

In other words, while science one day may be able to decifer all the physical phenomena (firing of neurons etc.) resulting in an experience, it will never be able to describe what makes a certain experience that experience.

Why not? Is this just “de fide”?

Or, more to the point, how would you know if it did describe those very experiences?

-TS

 

[CopticChristian]

OK, here’s a pretty glaring example that pops to mind:

That isn’t “ergo” from anything, mind you. It’s “de fide”.

Lots more where than came from, as you likely now. Sorry, don’t have enough familiarity with Coptic dogma/theology to pick on that (if you were thinking of something more apropos to your username).

-TS

So is this promiscuity or frivolity?